Michael Beck, 65, First to Report Symptoms of ‘Havana Syndrome,’ Dies

Michael Beck, 65, the first of scores of federal workers to develop neurological symptoms later dubbed Havana Syndrome, died on Saturday in Columbia, Md., his daughter, Regan, said; the cause of death had not been determined. Mr. Beck, a counterintelligence officer at the National Security Agency, said he was exposed to a direct-energy device that he claimed led to a diagnosis of a rare form of Parkinson’s disease.

He told reporters that he began experiencing debilitating symptoms much earlier than many other federal employees. His case dated back to 1996, when he and another N.S.A. employee, Charles W. Gubete, traveled to a hostile country unnamed by him and the government to check for listening devices.

They encountered what Mr. Beck later described as a “technical threat” at the site; the next morning he awoke unusually groggy, a memory he recounted to The Guardian. About a decade later Mr. Beck developed persistent neurological problems: he said he had trouble finding letters on the keyboard, his right arm and hand were stiff, and his right leg dragged.

A neurologist in 2012 diagnosed Parkinson’s disease. After seeing Mr. Gubete, who was later also diagnosed and died the next year, Mr. Beck read a classified report that associated the hostile country with a high-powered microwave system, a finding the N.S.A. said it had intelligence to support; he told The Washington Post in 2017 that he was “sick in the stomach and shocked” by the report.

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